Riccardo Tisci on the final iteration of his sell-out Nike RTs

Talking Air Force 1s, Kim Kardashian and the dead people he'd love to have dressed

It’s just after one o’clock on a sun-drenched September afternoon in Madrid. Dressed in all-black with a newly grown-out, impressively lustrous moustache, Riccardo Tisci sits serenely on the balcony of his hotel room while press reps fluster around him. Most famous among fashion folk for being the man that reinvented Givenchy since he signed on as the historic French fashion house’s creative director in 2005, the Italian native has also made a name for himself with some incredibly cool side projects over the past few years: designing costumes for Beyoncé’s Mrs Carter tour, coming up with the cover art for Watch The Throne, dressing Kanye West and Kim Kardashian West for their wedding earlier this year… oh, and collaborating with Nike on a sell-out selection of limited-edition Air Force Ones. All in a day’s work for one of the most in-demand designers currently on the style scene.

This last side project is the reason we’re in town: the launch of the third and final (for now) drop of his superb Nike + RT line, which will arrive in shops across the globe on 16 October – a selection of four styles (low-top, mid-top, high-top and gladiator boot) that in contrast to its neon-infused white and black forebears, this time comes in a more subdued beige version with greyscale detailing.

And so starts our interview, first about the couple who have got the world talking, and moving on to his love for white Air Force Ones, who he’d like to see wearing his shoes and whether we can expect a fourth iteration of the Nike + RT line any time soon…

You know Kim fairly well…What is it you like about her?
I’ve been friends with Kanye for seven years, and in general I’m not the type of person who likes to judge people. I don’t like to be judged and I don’t like to judge. I’m also not the type of person to watch television – I mostly read magazines and [social] media. I choose what I want to read because the media can be full of crap and make people worried. So I didn’t know this phenomenon of the Kardashian family. Kanye and I are very close and have done a lot of collaborations together – I designed the Watch The Throne [album] cover and the costumes and stage for Jay Z and Kanye.

When they started dating Kanye came up to me and said we should all get dinner, so they came to Paris to visit me. I like the girl. She’s cool, she’s also different from what people think. She’s very special. Very beautiful. Then I found out from fashion people that people didn’t like her, people didn’t want anything to do with her. I’m a Leo and Italian and very proud, so I didn’t change my way about them. I invited them to the show, started doing special projects with them, dressing them and I got killed so much. But that’s what you do to be a friend, to be real – you don’t care about what people are saying.

What is it you like about them together?
As a couple I like them because they represent the society of today – an aesthetically beautiful couple, of course, very open, both of them business people, she’s a good mother, he’s a good father. It’s a modern love story – he didn’t care what people thought about her, he just believed in love.

You dressed both of them for their wedding in Florence. How did it feel to be involved?
When they asked me to do their wedding, Kanye came up to me as a fan and asked for my opinion of things. We sat down and talked about what he wanted to do as it was a very special wedding, very elegant, very modern. I was very happy she asked me to design the dress. By the time they came to get married, about 50 per cent of fashion people had changed their minds about her, [and] about Kim and Kanye [as a couple], when the Vogue America cover came out. It was sweet because she could have asked a lot of people at that time – but she still asked me.

Speaking of dressing, have you worn Nikes for a long time?
I have worn them since I was 14, I’ve always worn white Air Force Ones. That’s no bullshit, you can go on the internet and search – I’m always in them! I used to play [basketball] when I was young, like 16, and was obsessed with sports culture. So basically I’ve been wearing them for a long time, and I’m not very “fashionable” in the way I dress – I’m always in black jeans, white trainers and black shirts.

Sounds pretty spot-on for fashion right now…
No, it’s just normal for me – that is my look. Other sports labels have approached me in the past, but it wasn’t quite the right time – I’ve been too busy. Anything I’ve done outside of my daily job [at Givenchy] has been out of love, but I have enough work myself. When Nike called me it sounded so real, so natural and I had to meet them. It’s kind of like the president of America because, after the American flag, it’s one of [those iconic things you] think about when you think of America like Coca-Cola, Marlboro Lights and now Obama.

Is this something you want to continue?
Well nothing’s signed yet, but, yes, it’s something I want to continue.

So why did you want to do this project?
You know, I work in the luxury world and sometimes it feels strange where I come from which is a very normal family and if you go back to when I was a kid I didn’t have the money to buy [luxury] clothes. So when I did this project with Nike, now I’m on the other side of the game – I know there is a younger generation that want to be part of my journey, my world and can’t afford it. This is a very successful project of love for me because now they can – that’s a great thing.

This third iteration is quite different to the first two, much more subdued while the last ones were brighter. What’s was the thought behind the colours of the different drops?
Society is divided naturally into gangs – related to music, the way people eat, the way we travel, the way we dress. In the beginning I decided on five groups, but then I cut that down to three and that [became the base for the three drops of trainers]. The [first] white pack was related to [people who are into] music like rap and R&B. The second [black pack] was more rock and roll, dark, gothic. And the third is more hipster, more organic and natural. It is very strange as I have only worn [plain] white Air Force Ones since forever, but out of the three groups of Nike I have made, the one I am obsessed with is the black.

Well judging by the crowd you run with now we’d say you’re pretty rock and roll, so that makes sense, right?
Yeah, but that could also be rap I guess. Kanye and Kim are more [the white version], I’d say.

Is there anyone you’d still like to dress?
Often when it comes to dressing people, it’s people who have died. My dream has always been to dress Frida Kahlo or Marlene Dietrich or Eva Peron – I love strong women with a point of view.

Do you ever still get starstruck when you see people see wearing your shoes?
I have a lot of people who I respect, but I’m not a starf*****. Sometimes people in fashion think I’m a little bit snobby because I sometimes say “no” to clothes for people, but sometimes when I go around strange places like an airport or a supermarket and see people wearing Givenchy or [my Nikes] in the sort of way that I think is cool, that makes me emotional – I like to see my ideas about dressing interpreted in a different way.